Posted on 12/09/2006 7:35:11 AM PST by KevinDavis
Will the Shuttle go or not... It all depends on the weather...
spaceflightnow.com
2325 GMT (6:25 p.m. EST)
The next task is relocating the grapple fixture from the top of P5. The fixture was used for robotic arm maneuvering of the truss. But it needs to be moved now to clear it out of the way of future station activities.
2315 GMT (6:15 p.m. EST)
The spacewalkers are giving the attachment bolts a final torque as they wrap up the Port 5 installation job. The space station has grown 4,110 pounds in mass with the addition of this new truss segment.
spaceflightnow.com
0016 GMT (7:16 p.m. EST Tues.)
Since the EVA is going smoothly, Mission Control has approved the addition of some get-ahead tasks on the Port 5 truss. So the spacewalkers will be turning their attention to routing some utility cables between the Port 4 truss to the newly-installed P5.
spaceflightnow.com
1521 GMT (10:21 a.m. EST)
The shuttle crew just received its wakeup call Mission Control to begin flight day 5. Meanwhile, the station crew will be getting up in about 30 minutes. On tap today is retracting one of the Port 6 truss' solar wings.
spaceflightnow.com
2304 GMT (6:04 p.m. EST)
The wing has been redeployed out to 28 bays. Retraction is once again resuming.
They've given up.
Crap, they worked on that array for most of their day. retract and it would wrinkle up.. back n forth
Talk about frustrating. I wanted to reach right through the TV and give that sucker a big "WHACK"!
I felt the same way...except I wanted to poke a stick in it.
spaceflightnow.com
1530 GMT (10:30 a.m. EST)
The Discovery astronauts are gearing up for a critical spacewalk today to begin re-wiring the international space station while engineers debate whether to add an unplanned spacewalk early next week to help coax an unruly solar array into full retraction.
Astronauts Robert Curbeam and Christer Fuglesang, Sweden's first man in space, are scheduled to begin a planned six-hour spacewalk at 3:12 p.m., their second in three days. The goal of this excursion is to switch two of the station's four major electrical circuits over to the lab's permanent power system.
The other two circuits will be re-wired during a spacewalk Saturday by Curbeam and newly arrived station astronaut Sunita "Suni" Williams. Both spacewalks are required to route electricity from the station's main arrays through big switching units and transformers on the solar array truss that make up the lab's permanent power system.
spaceflightnow.com
1805 GMT (1:05 p.m. EST)
Spacewalk preparations are underway aboard the space station today, along with powerdowns and reconfigurations in advance of the electrical re-wiring to be performed during the EVA. No particular problems have been reported today.
spaceflightnow.com
1940 GMT (2:40 p.m. EST)
Depressurization of the airlock has been completed. The outer hatch of the airlock module is being opened.
spaceflightnow.com
2230 GMT (5:30 p.m. EST)
One hour and 54 minutes into a planned six-hour spacewalk, astronauts Robert Curbeam and Christer Fuglesang completed their electrical re-wiring work to route electricity from the space station's solar arrays into two of the four main circuits making up the lab's permanent power system.
YEA!...there's finally some down linked video! I guess I turned it on when they were on the wrong side of the planet.
spaceflightnow.com
2310 GMT (6:10 p.m. EST)
After spacewalkers re-wired two of the space station's four main electrical circuits, flight controllers at the Johnson Space Center in Houston successfully activated a critical cooling system in a major milestone for station assembly.
Hi Kevin, Thanks for your links... around 2.30 am here for the launch.
Even the wife was awake to watch it.
Very cool stuff these night launches.
Prayers from us both for a successful mission and a safe return.
spaceflightnow.com
1630 GMT (11:30 a.m. EST)
Astronauts Robert Curbeam and Sunita "Suni" Williams are gearing up for a critical spacewalk today to finish re-wiring the international space station. If time is available and no major problems develop, they also plan to inspect a balky solar array and perhaps shake it a bit to free up a stuck guide wire that is preventing its full retraction.
spaceflightnow.com
1730 GMT (12:30 p.m. EST)
The powering down of space station systems in preparation for today's electrical re-wiring job by the spacewalkers is underway. The EVA is scheduled to begin in about two hours.
spaceflightnow.com
1942 GMT (2:42 p.m. EST)
The spacewalkers have egressed the airlock hatchway to space. This is Curbeam's sixth spacewalk and the first for Williams.
1931 GMT (2:31 p.m. EST)
Mission Control has warned the station crew that lights and communications systems will be going off now as the partial powerdown is completed for the spacewalk.
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